Redantruare: Body and Kinesthesia in the Salian Ceremony

Abstract

Taking into account the critical approaches that characterize movement and dance studies as well as an exhaustive reading of the evidence, this paper examines various aspects of the Salian ceremony and its relation to the complex concept of ‘Romanness’. For the past century, scholars have questioned the functions and contexts of these rites, but the importance of choreography as a channel for religious participation has been largely overlooked, especially in what concerns to the relationship between performance, territory and visibility. For this phenomenological approach to the rite, I will consider a series of somatic and kinesthetic processes that explain the spectators’ involvement in the dance. We will also emphasize the potential of this choreography to reflect and (re)create the identity of the Roman elite in the construction of the citizen body.